


like a breath of fresh air

by unicyclehippo



Series: Blue Girls Have The Most Fun [47]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:21:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25667368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unicyclehippo/pseuds/unicyclehippo
Summary: prompt: beaujester first kiss... that's all. smooch time but with some angst
Relationships: Jester Lavorre/Beauregard Lionett
Series: Blue Girls Have The Most Fun [47]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1824289
Comments: 2
Kudos: 128





	like a breath of fresh air

It’s when the automaton unhinges it’s metal jaw and leans forward, emitting the thin and then very strong and fast expulsion of poison into the air that everything goes to shit. Most of them are outside the range of it, or on the edge and able to take a few steps back, but Jester—Jester is in the thick of it.

Beau throws herself into the fog. Feels the cloud close in around her. She holds her breath and advances, hands outstretched and eyes wide behind her goggles, toward where she knows Jester had been. She hears her before she sees her, hacking and coughing in the centre of this yellow-green cloud. Dropping to her knees beside her, arms wrapping around Jester’s chest, Beau lifts her enough to be able to do this. She slides a hand behind Jester’s neck.

Jester’s eyes flutter, roll.

Beau lifts a prayer to the Traveller— _please be looking out for her, be unselfish for once in your life_ , please—and, cupping Jester’s cheek with her other hand, she lifts Jester close as she leans down and slots their lips together. Pushes all the breath she can into Jester’s lungs and retreats, sliding her hand over Jester’s mouth so she can keep it.

Sucking in her first lungful of the poison sucks major ass. It pulls and stings at her lungs, hurts just on the other side of actually doing damage; it hurts but it can’t harm her. It hurts, but it can’t harm her and she counts on that as she pulls Jester from the cloud, out to fresh air.

* * *

She finds her that night in their room. Plants her palm on the door and slams it open, though she catches the door handle before it can impact against the wall. Beau doesn’t look up from the hand she’s been testing but she watches out of her peripheries as Jester pulls the door shut and presses back against it.

For a time, Jester says nothing. Then, ‘Fjord saved me once, like that.’

‘Huh?’

‘Kissing me.’ Jester steps further into the room. She sits down opposite her, looks at Beau’s once-broken hand. ‘How is it?’

‘Full range of movement, it looks like.’

‘Does it hurt?’ Jester asks, a sharpness to her tone like that is what she had meant the first time and Beau ought to have known that.

Beau looks up finally. Meets Jester’s eyes for a second before she looks down again. ‘A little.’

Jester hums. Reaching out, her fingers begin to glow with familiar emerald. She strokes along Beau’s fingers, over her knuckles. Everywhere they move, her fingers leave a faint tingling trace, and Beau isn’t quite sure if it’s from her magic or from Jester.

‘Thank you. For saving my life.’

‘Yeah. Of course. Always.’

Jester’s fingers swirl over Beau’s scarred knuckles, trips over them like an unfamiliar stair in the dark. ‘Nott said it doesn’t count. As a kiss. Well, she said it might if it meant something to both of us but then she told me this whole romantic story about her and Yeza and,’

‘Wait, is this about today? Or Fjord?’

‘Fjord.’

‘Oh.’

‘But… It’s basically the same, right? I mean, you did - we did,’ Jester stammers, lifts her other hand only a short way up off her lap. Beau feels her whole body flush, knowing that that hand was headed for Jester’s lips.

It kills her to say it, but it has to be said.

‘It wasn’t a kiss, Jes.’

‘Oh.’

‘You couldn’t breathe.’

‘Right. Of course. Right. Totally, I knew that.’

Jester’s fingers slip away from her own and before she knows what she’s doing, before she can go too far, Beau reaches out and catches Jester’s hand in her own.

‘Beau?’

Beau’s mouth opens and closes a few times. She hadn’t planned what she would say, or do, beyond not wanting Jester’s hand to leave hers. Her brain buzzes, trying to choose between what she wants to say, what Jester deserves to know, what she _wants_ Jester to know.

Finally, she says, ‘It’s yours.’

Jester frowns, confused. She tilts her head. ‘What’s mine?’

‘Your first – your first kiss. It’s yours. To give to whoever you want. Whether that’s to - to Fjord, or me, or anyone else. Whoever _you_ choose. It isn’t something we’re gonna take from you when we save your life. That’d be - wrong. Fucked up. That’s something - it’s _yours_ , Jes.’

‘Mine.’

‘Yeah.’

Jester purses her lips thoughtfully. Examines their hands—now entwined as Beau’s fingers had fallen messily into a tangle with hers—and she swipes her thumb over Beau’s. Looks up, eyes filled with caution.

‘Do you want it?’

Beau swallows. ‘Your first kiss?’

‘Mhm.’

‘I—‘ _Say yes,_ her mind screams. Say it! right now! Beau has never been good at listening to that voice, preferring to act on the impulse of her gut and fists. But her hands are gentled now and wrapped in Jester’s hands and her gut is useless, twisting and turning with nerves. ‘Y-yeah. I mean, yeah! If - if you’re sure.’

Jester’s smile is a slow and wonderful thing. Literally, full of wonder as she reaches forward for Beau, eyes wide and delighted as though she can’t believe she is allowed to do it. Cold fingers graze over Beau’s cheek and down, down her neck making her shiver before settling on her shoulder.

Her other hand she leaves entwined.

Stepping forward, Jester ducks her head to meet Beau’s, seated as she is.

‘Close your eyes,’ she demands.

Beau obeys, hearing the nerves in Jester’s voice.

A moment passes, then another, and then she feels it; cool lips pressed against her own in a barely-there kiss.

‘Again?’ Beau suggests, very quietly. Maybe asks. Hopes, definitely.

Jester’s hand tightens on her shoulder. Her nose bumps into Beau’s, who tilts her head up a little more to help, and Jester kisses her more firmly. This time, when she pulls away, Beau sighs happily and opens her eyes. She’d be embarrassed that they flutter a little, wanting to stay closed to revel in that, but Jester is too much of a joy to look at to deny herself. Cheeks flushed a light purple, eyes dark, lower lip caught between sharp teeth.

‘Thank you,’ Beau croaks after a moment. ‘Awesome.’

‘You think? It was okay?’

‘It was great. Good. Perfect,’ Beau adds, because Jester’s expression had faltered minutely when Beau said good. ‘Yeah. Hell yeah.’


End file.
